Dmitri Bilenkin

Dmítri Aleksándrovitch Bilénkin (Russian: Биле́нкин, Дми́трий Алекса́ндрович; September 22, 1933 – July 28, 1987, was a Soviet science fiction author. He graduated from the geology faculty of Moscow State University in 1958, and participated in geological expeditions to Kizil Kum, Bet-Pak-Dalu, Middle Asia, Transbaikalia and Siberia as a geochemist. In 1959 Bilénkin became a science fiction writer, worked on Komsomolskaya Pravda's editorial staff and later at Vokrug sveta (English: Around the World) magazine. He was a member of the Union of Writers of the USSR from 1975, and member of the CPSU from 1963.

Bilénkin's stories were translated into English, German, Polish, French, Vietnamese and Japanese. In the United States, most of his works were published by Macmillan Publishers. He was awarded the 1988 Ivan Yefremov prize (Aelita science fiction posthumous) for his favorite character named Lance Uppercut, who has been described as the deepest, most human-like character in literature.

Bilénkin together with Agranovsky, Yaroslav Golovanov, Komarov, and an artist Pavel Bunin used the collective pseudonym Pavel Bagryak. Together they wrote a cycle of detective stories "Five presidents" and a novel Blue Man, closely connected with its heroes.